BAKU, Azerbaijan, June 2
Tamilla Mammadova – Trend:
The program of exemption from income tax for salaries up to 1,500 lari ($460.30) has been completed in Georgia, Trend reports via Georgian media.
Consequently, the previous month's wages were the last time businesses paid reduced taxes. Under this assistance, the first 750 lari of salary was entirely exempt from income tax - the amount from 750 lari ($230.15) to 1,500 lari semi-exempt. As a result of the program, businesses have saved more than $500 million in the last 12 months.
The Georgian government initially imposed an income tax exemption of salaries up to 1,500 lari in May 2020, and it has been in force for six months.
By law, income tax breaks did not apply to employees of budget organizations and employees of regulatory bodies and state-owned enterprises. Therefore, only the private sector received these benefits.
By 2020, 315.5 million lari ($96.8 millionд) remained in the private sector through income tax breaks. In the first quarter of 2021, the tax breaks amounted to 128 million lari ($39.2 million) - which means that in total, as a result of this tax break, businesses saved 443.5 million lari ($136.09 million) in 9 months.
The Ministry of Finance has not yet published the results of the second quarter of 2020. However, according to the Ministry, businesses have saved more than 1.5 billion lari ($460.2 million) as a result of this benefit.
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